Here's Exactly When People Will Notice That You've Lost Weight

If you're working on losing a few extra pounds these days or just being healthier in general, you're likely aware that, in addition to the exercise endorphins, new fondness of fresh, good-for-you foods, and general HBIC vibes you draw from taking care of yourself, there's a totally superficial fringe benefit: Duh, you'll look even hotter. Recently, University of Toronto researchers took on a question we never thought to ask: Exactly how much weight does one have to lose to look quote-unquote better? You're obviously gorge already, but their results, published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science put some science behind when people will actually* notic*e all those trips to the gym.

The scientists started with photos of the faces of men and women ages 20 to 40 and digitally altered them to put on a few pounds. (Apparently "facial adiposity" is a great proxy for overall body mass index, or BMI—who knew?) Then, by having study participants draw headshot pairs and note which face looked heavier to them, the researchers calculated the magic number when weight loss becomes visible in the face: It's when your BMI drops by 2.93. (That's 2.93 lbs./m2, the units for BMI; you can calculate your own BMI here.)

Next, researchers sussed out the threshold at which a change in facial adiposity cued a change in their perceived attractiveness. Turns out women's BMI had to shift by 5.24, and men's had to shift by 5.7, for anyone to rate their beauty differently. To put that in human terms, this translates to about 13.9 pounds for the average woman and 18.1 pounds for the average man.

To put it bluntly: "Women and men of average height need to gain or lose about about 8 and 9 pounds, respectively, for anyone to see it in their face, but they need to lose about twice as much for anyone to find them more attractive," lead author Nicholas Rule told Medical News Today.

The upshot? One, men have to lose more weight than women to get the attractiveness boost, so there's that. Two, you probably don't have to hit your goal weight to start noticing a difference. And three, you likely can gain 10+ pounds and not look one iota less hot. This study is fun and interesting, but let's be real: None of us really need to care about what strangers in a Canadian research lab think about our looks. So drop the mike...and pass the Christmas cookies.